The Office is a wildly popular American TV show that was originally created in Britain. The American version differs from the original—but I have only seen a handful of the British episodes—so I will not comment on that and that is also beyond the scope of this writeup. For itself, the show opens itself up to much interpretation. The Ribbon Farm has an absolute must-read series of posts analyzing power relations in the modern workplace through the lens of the The Office. However, for my purposes here, I wish to talk about Michael Scott, as he is a perfect example of Read More

For a country that has existed less than one hundred years, Finland has had a violent history. The White Guard defeated the (communist) Red Guard in a bloody civil war, which ended in brutal executions of the defeated Reds. Twenty years later, the Soviet Union attempted to invade Finland in the Winter War. Not long after, the Continuation War broke out only to be followed by the Lapland War against the Germans. Through feats of heroic fighting and sacrifice, Finland managed stay independent amidst the fires of the Second World War. Both my grandfathers (and their fathers) fought in the Second Read More

This year I visited Cap-Haitien, which is on the North coast of Haiti and about the 10th largest city in the country. Here are my observations and thoughts on what I saw during the 4-day trip. Disrepair My impression of Haiti is a country in complete disrepair…buildings, utilities, water, electricity, police, government fiscal management…nothing works in Haiti. I did see one exception. Everyday a garbage truck came by and collected garbage. I found this interesting that somehow the government was able to get that done when they are so ineffective at most everything else. My only conclusion was that garbage piling up Read More

This is your friendly reminder that the live stream is happening tonight at 7pm EST. You can tune in at this Youtube address if you want to view the live chat feed or click play below to listen in: Read More

Last week, I outlined book (i.e., chapter) seven of Xenophon's The Economist. This week we'll look at books eight through ten. These four chapters are the (in)famous part of the work in which a man describes how he trained his young wife to be a real woman. I would recommend reading last week's article first. Know Thyself Book eight begins with Ischomachus recounting a time when his wife was embarrassed that she was unable to do bring him the food item he asked for even though they didn't have it anyway. Most women today would make an excuse for lack of servility Read More